Multi-media messaging involves integrating discrete messages or individual message components of different media, e.g., voice, text, video, and the ability to deliver the integrated messages through a single universal mailbox.
The integration of voice and facsimile (fax) messages is well known in the art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,008,926, discloses an integrated voice-and-facsimile store-and-forward message system that provides for the sending, storage, and delivery of voice messages, fax messages, fax messages annotated with voice messages, and voice messages annotated with fax messages. The disclosed system additionally provides for display of fax messages on terminal screens, and the conversion of fax printed text messages into voice messages via text-to-speech conversion facilities.
Electronic mail, or e-mail, systems are also well known in the art. They provide for the sending, storage, and delivery between computer terminals of displayable data--text and/or graphics--messages.
Integration of e-mail systems with voice-and-fax message systems is highly desirable. For example, it is becoming common for salesmen to work out of "mobile offices"--their cars--which are equipped normally with telephones, often with fax machines, but generally not with data terminals, yet the salesmen would like to have the capability of receiving in their mobile offices messages sent to them in any form--voice, fax, or e-mail. The integration of fax and e-mail messaging is readily accomplished through conversion of e-mail messages into fax messages for delivery to their recipients. But while fax machines are more likely to be available to mobile recipients of the messages than data terminals, they are not as readily available as telephones. Therefore, it is often preferable to instead accomplish the integration of voice and e-mail messaging through conversion of e-mail messages into voice messages for delivery to their recipients. This type of conversion is also readily accomplished if the e-mail messages constitute text only.
A problem arises, however, when e-mail messages constitute information other than text--such as diagrams, charts, special symbols, computer code fragments, pictures, etc.--which is not suitable for conversion into a voice message. Attempts to convert such data message segments into speech result in unintelligible garble. This may be avoided by simply identifying and discarding the non-voiceable data message segments, but this results in the delivery of an incomplete message to the recipient--an unacceptable result.